I'm not going to continue doing that for every single season, but you can look through every single season and see if you can find a strong correlation between strikeouts and runs scored if you want. I don't think you'll find one. As far as the 2011 World Series, the White Sox had the second fewest strikeouts with 989 and scored a whopping 654 runs.

Perhaps there is no correlation between an offense's K rate and runs scored (I don't know either way), but in a recent Grantland article on the Royals continued lack of success Jonah Keri and Rany Jazayerli argue that there is one between BB rate and runs scored.

I'm not going to continue doing that for every single season, but you can look through every single season and see if you can find a strong correlation between strikeouts and runs scored if you want. I don't think you'll find one. As far as the 2011 World Series, the White Sox had the second fewest strikeouts with 989 and scored a whopping 654 runs.

You continue to miss the point. It's not about total runs scored out of context. It's about not giving up outs. Giving up outs is something you don't want to do if you want to win.

When the Rangers were at their best offensively and went to the World Series, they were striking out less than any other team in the league. When the Giants won the World Series last year after running away with their division, they had the second fewest strikeouts in the majors despite having a couple of starting pitchers who struck out in about half of their plate appearances. If you don't have a great offense, and the Giants hit fewer than 100 home runs, not striking out allows you to do more things to score runs. If you lead the league in batting average, as the Rangers and Cardinals did with the fewest NL strikeouts in 2011, striking out less means more means you have more productive outs and you manufacture more runs. Not striking out is something that improves your offense.

Regardless of what statisticians who never played the game might conclude, the reality is about not giving up outs when you have two strikes on you. The more you strike out, the harder our offense has to work to score. Really, that should be obvious when you watch baseball.

Even if you look at baseball as rolls of the dice and percentages, I don't see how anyone can defend players who intentionally decrease their chances of some level of success with two strikes by refusing to shorten their swings to make contact, to focus on making contact, when even a foul tip can put them out with only the catcher tested defensively.

I'm not going to continue doing that for every single season, but you can look through every single season and see if you can find a strong correlation between strikeouts and runs scored if you want. I don't think you'll find one. As far as the 2011 World Series, the White Sox had the second fewest strikeouts with 989 and scored a whopping 654 runs.

How many of those teams hit .180?

If you look at the teams that scored the most runs, you will find they are all in the lower half of the league in strikeouts, btw. Yanks, LA and Tex all K'd less than 1200 times, compared to average of about 1350 of the top 3 teams. Same with 2011, Texas had the lowest K rate, all top three teams in runs in lower half.

You continue to miss the point. It's not about total runs scored out of context. It's about not giving up outs. Giving up outs is something you don't want to do if you want to win.

When the Rangers were at their best offensively and went to the World Series, they were striking out less than any other team in the league. When the Giants won the World Series last year after running away with their division, they had the second fewest strikeouts in the majors despite having a couple of starting pitchers who struck out in about half of their plate appearances. If you don't have a great offense, and the Giants hit fewer than 100 home runs, not striking out allows you to do more things to score runs. If you lead the league in batting average, as the Rangers and Cardinals did with the fewest NL strikeouts in 2011, striking out less means more means you have more productive outs and you manufacture more runs. Not striking out is something that improves your offense.

Regardless of what statisticians who never played the game might conclude, the reality is about not giving up outs when you have two strikes on you. The more you strike out, the harder our offense has to work to score. Really, that should be obvious when you watch baseball.

Even if you look at baseball as rolls of the dice and percentages, I don't see how anyone can defend players who intentionally decrease their chances of some level of success with two strikes by refusing to shorten their swings to make contact, to focus on making contact, when even a foul tip can put them out with only the catcher tested defensively.

I am not missing any point. You continue to indicate that not striking out is a better indicator of a good offense than scoring runs. Also, could you go one or two posts without indicating that anyone who doesn't agree with you doesn't watch the game?

The best - the only - indicator of the "best offense" is that which scores the most runs the most consistently.

Teams that score the most runs the most consistently almost always have the ability to score runs in multiple ways: power, speed, batting average, plate discipline to take walks and drive up pitch counts, manufacturing runs, smart base running, etc.

__________________The universe is the practical joke of the General at the expense of the Particular, quoth Frater Perdurabo, and laughed. The disciples nearest him wept, seeing the Universal Sorrow. Others laughed, seeing the Universal Joke. Others wept. Others laughed. Others wept because they couldn't see the Joke, and others laughed lest they should be thought not to see the Joke. But though FRATER laughed openly, he wept secretly; and really he neither laughed nor wept. Nor did he mean what he said.

I am not missing any point. You continue to indicate that not striking out is a better indicator of a good offense than scoring runs. Also, could you go one or two posts without indicating that anyone who doesn't agree with you doesn't watch the game?

If that is what you believe I am indicating, you indeed are missing the point.

Strikeouts are not an indicator of whether an offense is good or bad. The only one statistic that indicates that is runs scored, and even that doesn't tell you how good an offense might be against a given team or pitcher in a given setting. Strikeouts do indicate a level of vulnerability that hold your team back.

Striking out less improves your offense. It allows you to manufacture more runs. Teams that are successful tend to manufacture a lot of runs whether or not their run totals indicate they have a good offense.

If you are a hitter that strikes out a lot and has a low batting average, you have been an easy out against pitchers who throw strikes. It is rare when you are not hurting your offense.

We aren't talking about hitters changing their hitting styles and taking away from their strengths. We are talking about enhancing their weaknesses. We are talking about hitters focusing on putting the ball in play when they are faced with two strike counts, improving their chances of not making an out.